WASHINGTON — More than four years after a Boeing 737-800 passenger jet plunged 29,000 feet and crashed into a mountain in southern China, killing all 132 people on board, newly released data appears to indicate that someone in the cockpit may have intentionally cut off the fuel supply to the engines.
It was China’s deadliest air disaster in decades, but the cause of the incident has long remained a mystery.
The Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) has not addressed the crucial question of what had prompted the deadly nosedive of China Eastern Airlines flight MU5735 in March 2022 in remote Guangxi region.
Data released by the US National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) in response to a freedom of information request, shows that the fuel switches to both engines were shut off simultaneously before the Boeing 737-800 jet dropped out of the sky.
The data was taken from the plane’s flight data recorder — one of two so-called “black boxes” that record all relevant operational information — which was recovered from the wreckage and sent to the NTSB’s laboratory in Washington DC for analysis.
In March 2022, the jetliner had departed from Kunming, the capital of Yunnan, and had been due to land in Guangzhou on the same afternoon.
The plane had been in the air for more than an hour and was nearing its destination when it suddenly plummeted from its cruising height — with flight tracker data showing that it dropped thousands of metres in under three minutes.
According to tracking site FlightRadar24, the plane was cruising at 29,100ft (9,000m), but two minutes and 15 seconds later it was recorded at 9,075ft. The last sourced information on the flight showed it ended at 14:22 local time, at an altitude of 3,225ft.
Because the incident took place in China and involved a Chinese airline, China’s CAA led investigations. As the Boeing 737 was designed and built in the US, however, the NTSB appointed a senior air safety investigator to assist.
Investigators were expected to look at several possible causes — including deliberate action, pilot error, or technical issues such as a structural failure or mid-air collision.
Shortly after the crash, Zhu Tao, aviation safety office director at the CAA, told reporters that they did not have a clear assessment of the cause for the crash.
Air controllers had repeatedly called the aircraft during its descent but had received no response, he added
But the CAA maintained that the crew held valid licences, were adequately rested and passed health checks on the day of the flight.
Multiple media outlets had previously speculated that the plane crash was intentionally caused by someone in the cockpit.
The Wall Street Journal reported in May 2022 that information extracted from the plane’s damaged flight data recorder shows human input orders to the controls sent the plane into its deadly dive, citing people familiar with the probe.
“The plane did what it was told to do by someone in the cockpit,” the Journal quoted a person who is familiar with American officials’ preliminary assessment as saying.
American officials involved in the investigation were focusing on the actions of a pilot, the Journal reported at the time, adding that it was also possible that someone else on the plane could have broken into the cockpit and deliberately caused the crash.
The CAA previously issued a denial amid speculation that the crash was a case of pilot suicide.
“These rumors…have seriously misled the public and interfered with the investigation of the accident,” Wu Shijie, a CAA official, told a press conference in April 2022.
China has been criticized for not releasing a final report on the incident, while the CAA has warned that “disclosure [about the crash] may, if released, endanger national security and social stability”.
Airplane crashes are rare in China, where air safety and aviation standards have improved vastly in recent decades.
Source: Saudi Gazette